A Better Busking Night

61 Cents Well Spent

Acoustically Superior!

Did someone once say that luck is when preparation meets opportunity or something like that?

Yesterday, I was up at about noon. The 61 cent sleeping bag, which I had gotten at the Wings of Life Thrift Store had worked like a charm; with the only drawback that it slides rather easily over cardboard and I kept waking up and finding myself halfway out from under the holly bush and exposed to the bright lights from the State Dock, having only been stopped from sliding further by coming off the edge of the cardboard and encountering friction from the dirt surface. The sleeping bag is a vivid red and blue and I'm sure that it is visible from space when under those lights -one of the hazards of sleeping on an incline of a couple of degrees.

This also moves me a few feet closer to the railroad tracks. I have been startled a few times when I woke up and opened my eyes and the first thing I've seen is a locomotive barreling down upon me at 60 miles per hour and passing within 15 feet of me. Make that 12 feet and the effect is exponentially increase. It's something that catches me by surprise every so often; no matter how accustomed I have become to 500,000 tons of steel whizzing past me at all hours of the night.

*Plus, when I slide out from under the holly bush, I no longer have it for protection, should the train derail and land on top of me.
Gabrielle

I decided to go for my morning energy drink and bought an additional one for the next morning to save myself that walk which has become a daily one. If the world ends and I still have an unconsumed energy drink; I'll just eat the loss -just the cost of doing business.

Getting back to Cathedral Park, I decided to warm up before recording anything, and as I was doing so I attracted the attention of a girl of about 18 years old, who  told me that I sounded good (I was playing "Mary Jane's Last Dance," by Tom Petty) and she sat next to me and wanted to play my guitar at one point.

I let her play E minor 7th to A minor 9th over and over for about 5 minutes when she stopped, citing a tired hand as the reason. Her name is Gabrielle, and she didn't know how to spell it -had either forgotten or had never learned. This IS Alabama, remember.

Well, I never recorded the warm-up because the park maintenance people came and began edging and weed eating and one of their tools was humming a B-flat just below middle C and it was wreaking havoc on my attempts to tune up in order to record something; plus, I didn't want the weed whacker on the recording as,  the water fountains are a distraction enough. At least they can be foisted off as some sort of nature sound to make Sea Breeze sound more soothing, the power tools; not so much...

Well, Gabrielle said that she was going to find me at night and would rap and beat box along with my music. ...look forward to seeing you, sweatie...
Well, she never materialized but, I started early (5 p.m.) at a spot not too far from the acoustically superior New York Hi Style spot (I couldn't play there because they were still open) and made a couple bucks in about a half hour, which I was grateful for.
Attitude Adjustment

I walked the mile to the Exxon on Water Street to capitalize on their 99 cent deal on 24 oz. cans of Steel Reserve -It's a Steel Reserve blow-out!

I then met a train hopping guy behind a building where I went to consume it. He was watching the trains and making assessments about them, based upon the number of locomotives, the direction of travel, the kind of locomotive and the type of payload. He seemed pretty knowledgeable but the only advice he could give me about going to Jacksonville was to ask the engineer (Pensacola or Montgomery?). Well, I could have figured that out without having had to sit through a half hour of his train hopping stories; though the one about The Yukon was kind of interesting....
I ran into a black man with a very round head, who has been in Mobile at least 3 years, who told me that I should be playing, because "Roll Tide won today!" (he thinks that is the name of the team; I wonder if he is an alumnus)

I then went and parked myself at the Hi Style spot, determined to play to the smaller but wealthier people who pass by there going to and from the $275 per night Hotel and the $80 per plate restaurants, rather than the masses of Joe Bloes (and Jane Bloes) gathered around 3 dollar draft beers and yelling "Roll Tide!" in between swallows.

The well heeled people keep pretty much to the fashion of eating dinner at 7:30 p.m. I guess that is when you eat dinner when you are so rich that you can eat dinner any time you want to eat dinner.

*When I walk up to the front of that particular hotel to look for cigarette butts I always hold up a hand to the valets and say "...not checking in, just looking for ducks..." which always gets a smile.*

I was playing well, but more importantly, I had regained my desire to play and had lost the last remnants of the hatred that has seemed to have crept into my heart, beginning around the time of my release from the Baton Rouge Parish Prison, the subsequent disappearance of a lot of stuff which is going to be a hassle to replace (I wanted to brush my hair this morning; I used to have about 5 brushes -a couple were from Jennie, wife of Jeff The Potter of Mobile; and at least one from Martin In West Virginia -but the cops somehow lost all of them, along with related items).

Glibby Glop Glooby

Did Officer Chutz of East Baton Rouge really intend to make it harder for me to stay groomed, and thus harder for me to get a job or even be allowed in public places, by taking my hairbrush; in an attempt to "keep me down?" Would he be happy to arrest me for trespassing on the property of anyone who didn't like my un-brushed hair and didn't want me around because af it?? These are questions that keep me awake at night, though I can sleep through the sound of freight trains.
I splurged on a 2 dollar beer and a pack of cigarettes last night, and my mission today is to get a pair of socks; so I will have 2 pair; and to try to get some kind of epoxy to put inside the Jasmine guitar where it is damaged and taped up with electrical tape but where it still makes an annoying buzz, especially when I hit certain chords, such as F major.
New strings are going to be a requirement for playing at the Florida/Georgia game. I might have to busk a little bit tonight and maybe at 7 a.m. tomorrow (Monday) morning to cash in on people who appreciate a work ethic and who recognize "Good Morning Starshine" from the musical "